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The
founder
The Almo Collegio Capranica is one of the most important
ecclesiastical institutions in the city of Rome and boasts a long
and illustrious history. On 5 January 1457 Cardinal Domenico
Capranica (1400-1458) founded the college that was to bear the name
of his family, expressly with the aim of providing young Romans of
more modest means the possibility to receive a comprehensive
programme of sacerdotal formation. Its foundation participates in
what was then a growing effort to discover new initiatives at
ameliorating ecclesiastical formation of the clergy. Ever responsive
to the exigencies of the milieu, the founder sought to proffer a
cleric better prepared under all aspects cultural and spiritual
formation, which remains to this day the unique particularity of the
Capranica.
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The
beginnings
The college was given a solid economic base by its founder, which
guaranteed its financial autonomy. It is noteworthy that the
original constitutions penned by the founder were supplemented only
at the end of the Twentieth Century. In 1459 the college opened its
doors to 30 students, entrusted to the administrative care of the
Archconfraternity of the Most Holy Redeemer ad Sancta Sanctorum, of
which the founder had been a member since 1452. Several years later,
in 1478, Cardinal Angelo Capranica (1423-1478) received the licence
from Pope Sixtus V to construct a specific seat for the Collegio
Capranica flanking the ancient palace of the Capranica family by the
church of Santa Maria in Aquiro. The Holy See added the title “Almo”
(that which gives life) for the dignity of the college as a sign of
the highest regard in which the papacy holds the college following
the sacrifice of the lives of the superiors and students (near the
Porta Santo Spirito) in defence of the pope during the sack of Rome
in 1527.
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While the administration of the college remained in the hands of the
Archconfraternity of the Most Holy Redeemer, proposing candidates
for entry to the college remained the competence of the leading
members of the Roman aristocracy, illustrious families close to the
Capranica family, and of the heads of the city’s zones. The students
were to follow the university courses in theology and canon law
provided by the University of Sapienza (Stadium Urbis), but from the
second half of the Sixteenth Century this was changed to the
Collegio Romano, recently founded and directed by the Society of
Jesus. Starting in 1592, the College received a Cardinal Protector -
in addition to the rector as superior - the first of whom was
Cardinal Michael Bonelli, Bishop of Albano. In 1661, Pope Alexander
VII reformed the procedure for nominating the rector, entrusted till
now to the students themselves (and expiring annually), making it a
nomination solely of the Holy See.
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The
Capranica Popes
The visscitudes of the Napoleonic era in Rome (during the years 1797
to 1807) severely affected the life of the College, interrupting its
activities - before work could painstakingly begin again on the
restoration of the institution itself and its plundered patrimony.
Across the course of the Nineteenth Century, the Almo Collegio
Capranica progressively affirmed its foundation as an institution
for excellence, and a seminary of great spiritual strength. The
relationship with the Pontifical Gregorian University and the
Accademia Ecclesiastica (Diplomatic Corps of the Holy See)
consistently grew more intense and fruitful, in as much as not a few
Capranicensi were called to pursue high office in the service of the
Holy See.
In 1917
Pope Benedict XV, an alumnus of the Almo Collegio Capranica, with
the motu proprio “Nobilissimam” entrusted the Patriarchal Basilica
of St Mary Major to the Almo Collegio Capranica for the “dignity of
the temple and the splendour of the ceremonies”. Between 1953 and
1955 the structure of the College underwent a radical project of
renovation. The inauguration of the “new College” was marked by the
memorable visit of Pope Pius XII (the alumnus Eugene Pacelli) that
took place on 21 January 1957, feast of the patroness of the
College, St Agnes – in the five-hundredth year of its foundation.
The College participated intensely in the season of renewal of the
Church promised by the Second Vatican Council, attentive to the new
theological and cultural elaborations that were formulated in those
years. With the brief “Propenso et sollicito animo” (28 June 1971),
Pope Paul VI instituted an Episcopal Commission nominated by the
Pontiff for the direction of the College.
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On 21
January 1980 John Paul II paid a visit to the College, presided at
the celebration of the Eucharist on the occasion of the solemnity of
Saint Agnes, patroness of the College, and met with the superiors
and students - sharing a meal with them. In August 1982, the Holy
Father approved the new Statute of the College which - n proper
continuity and in the spirit of renewal (as envisaged by the same
Constitutions of the Cardinal Founder) - indicates the structure and
the formative aims of the Almo Collegio Capranica: “an ecclesial,
educative community, within which students are formed for the
ministerial priesthood” (article 4). John Paul II returned to visit
the College with great paternity, illuminating the teachings of the
Church and sharing the life and prayer of the community on 21
January 1992, feast of Saint Agnes.
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